Birds birds birds birds... or, Playing Favorites
God walked into a room to face an audience of angels watching him expectantly.
"What?" he snapped, more surprised than annoyed. He hadn't forgotten any events or meetings... he thought...
The noise hit him a second later, and with it, the motion and colors- birds were everywhere, chirping, tweeting, honking, fluttering, darting around or tucked into cages made of lithe angel fingers. Each bird appeared to have been claimed by an angel. Anna was holding a cardinal, Castiel was holding a raven, even Metatron, obediently trailing after God with a pen and paper, was keeping an eye on a speckled grey button quail.
It was easy to see the connection between the bird and its angelic counterpart- the wings, of course. Ezekiel's bluebird had the same sky blue wings as Ezekiel himself. Same went for Hannah's light pink budgie, Samandriel's orange and brown cliff flycatcher, Uriel's white-speckled-black snowy owl, and Balthazar's yellow-black-white finch. Even Raphael was there, holding a red-winged blackbird (whose wings were, in fact, black AND red).
Gabriel walked in- this matter was starting to become very not trivial; two out of the four archangels were there, although it was the two youngest- holding a barn owl he'd done something to to make it gold and a peacock. A peacock? Despite the very serious looks he was getting, God was tempted to laugh when Gabriel set the peacock down with flair, and Lucifer walked in, swept the peacock away with a huff, and replaced it with a dove. Just behind him was Michael, holding a blackbird.
Every angel was in this room, staring at God... and Lucifer asked, "So which bird's your favorite?"
God froze.
They were definitely, no doubt, asking which angel was his favorite, hidden not-so-cleverly under the guise of picking the matching bird. Well, the dove was God's favorite, but he wasn't about to say as much. Instead, he stalked back to his workroom, where he was working on a second species of seal for Antarctica.
"This," God announced, quickly fiddling with the thing as he re-emerged, "is my favorite. It lives on the ice its whole life!"
"What kind of wings are those?" Raphael asked derisively.
"Swimming wings," God answered promptly. "It can't fly."
Thus, the penguin was born.
Enter angel wing headcanon. My hasty descriptions of the birds did not do them justice, and I recommend giving them a google image search.